Re - paper 1, section 4

Definitions

Community cohesion - a common vision and shared sense on belonging for all groups in society

Discrimination - treating people less favourably because of their ethnicity/gender/colour/sexuality/age/class etc

Ethnic minority - a member of an ethnic group (race) which is much smaller than the minority group

Interfaith marriages - marriage where the husband and wife are from different religions.

Multi-ethnic society -many different races and cultured living together in 1 society.

Multi-faith society - Many different religions living together in 1 society.

prejudice - believing some people are inferior or superior without even knowing them.

Racial harmony - different races/colours living together happily.

Racism - the belief that some races are superior to others.

Religious freedom - the right to practise your religions and change your religion.

Religious pluralism - accepting all religions as having an equal right to coexist.

Sexism - discriminating against people because of their gender.

1 of 14

Changing roles of male & females in the UK

During the second half of the 19th century it was expected that married women would stay at home to look after children. During 1882 and 1975 women gained right to:

Keep their property separate from husbands

Vote in elections and become councillors and MP's

Receive the same pay as men for the same work

In 19975, the Sex Discrimination Act reduced sexism in society by making it illegal to discriminate in employment on gender and marriage status.

Change was slow, most still do housework and receive few promotions/lower pay.

They attitudes changed due to:

Women were no longer willing to be treated as 2nd class citizens.

During wars, women had to fill jobs and done then as good as men did

Development of equal right in other countries made it difficult to say they were not needed everywhere

Social and industrial developments needed more workers, women had to fill these

The UN declaration of human rights developed the feminist movement enforcing equal rights.

The Labour governments were dedicated to equal rights.

2 of 14

Christian attitudes on equal right for women

Traditional attitude of Protestant Christianity:

Many Evangelical Protestants teach men and women should have different roles and not equal rights in religion. Women should not speak in church and leaders/teachers should be male.

In the Bible, St pauls teached women should speak in church

St Paul's uses the story of Adam being created before Eve to show God gave men more rights.

Jesus did have women followers but he only chose men as his 12 apostles.

Its tradition that Church should be lead by men.

Modern attitude of Protestant Christianity:

Many Protestant churches give men and women equal rights and have women priests.

The creation story in Genesis 1 says God created male and female at the same time in his image so they have equal status.

Paul teaches that men and women are equal.

There is evidence from the Gospels that Jesus treated women as his equals as he had women disciples who stayed with him at the cross, whereas the men ran away and after his resurrection, Jesus appeared first to his women disciples.

There is some evidence that there were women priests in the early Church.

3 of 14

Christian attitudes on equal right for women cont

Catholic attitudes to the roles of men and women:

The Catholic Church teaches that men and women should have equal rights in society and in religion except they cant be part of the ordained ministry (deacons, priests and bishops).

The creation story in Genesis 1 says that God created male and female at the same time in his image with equal status.

The Catholic Catechism teaches that men and women are equal and should have equal rights in religion and society.

Only men can be priests because the apostles were all men, and priest and bishops are successors of the apostles.

Only men can be priests because Jesus was a man and the priests represents Jesus in the Mass.

4 of 14

Islam and equal right for women

Traditional attitude:

Some Muslims believe that mean and women should have different roles in life and religion. They believe women should perform their religious duties (except hajj) in the home and men should worship God in the mosque with their sons and lead the religion.

The Qur'an teaches men should support women as they were given a stronger physique.

The Qur'an teaches women have been created to bear children.

The Qur'an teaches men need more money than women to be family providers.

its traditional for only men to attend the mosque and to be imams.

Modern attitude:

Some believe men and women should have equal rights in religion and education, few would accept women religious leaders.

The Qur'an teaches men and women are equal in religion and education.

Muhammad encouraged both women and men to worship in the mosque.

There were women religious leaders during the early stages of Islam.

They have been affected by the non-religious argument for equal rights for women.

Many British Muslims mix the 2 attitudes and agree with equal right but not in religion.

5 of 14

The UK as a multi-ethnic society

The UK has always been a mixed society: Celts, Romans, Angles, Saxons Jutes, Danes, Vikings and Normans are all ancestors of the British.

The Uk has always believed in human freedom and offers asylum to those suffering persecution. In 2001 Census, only 7.9% of the UK's population came from ethnic minorities, over half of these were born and educated in the UK.

Prejudiced teachersdiscriminate certain ethnic groups/religions, they don't achieve as well

Prejudiced police officers discriminate certain ethnic groups/religions by stopping them for no reason.

If certain groups feel they are treated unfairly, society will work against this.

Some politicians believe young black people turn to crime as they feel there not good enough for a well-paid job due to discrimination.

Some politicians believe young Muslims turn to extremist Islamic groups because they feel they don't have a chance of success in prejudices British society.

Racism and discrimination can lead to groups like BNP stirring up hared and violence.

For a multi-ethnic society to function well, it must treat all members fairly by giving equal opportunities.

People of different ethnic groups and nationalities get to know each other & intermarry

More progress will be made as new people bring new ideas and ways of doing things.

Life is more interesting with a greater variety of food, music, fashion, entertainment etc

It helps people to live and work in a world of multi-national companies and economic interdependence between all nations.

6 of 14

Government promoting community cohesion in UK

A multi-ethnic society needs to promote community cohesion in order to remove the prejudice, discrimination and racism. The British Government promotes CC by:

Making CC part of the National Curriculum.

Appointing the cabinet minsters, judges etc from ethnic minorities.

Passing the Race Relations Act which makes in unlawful to discriminate against anyone on their race, colour, nationality, ethnic or nation origins or to stir up religious hatred.

Passing the Crime and disorder Act which allows more severe punishments for offences invloving racial or religious hatred.

Passing the Racial and religious Hatred Act which makes it an offence to use threatening works or behaviour about religious beliefs or lack of belief.

Establishing the equality and Human Rights Commission which works to get rid of discrimination and to build good relationships.

Countries without CC have more violence.

lack of CC makes it impossible for people to co-operate in the way modern civilise living needs,

CC is about: avoiding bad effects of prejudice/discrimination, encouraging different groups to work together and ensuring people respect others while building up loyal citizens of the same society.

7 of 14

Why Christians promote racial harmony

Christians should try and promote racial harmony because:

The parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus showed that races who hated each other (eg. Jews and samaritans) should love each other as neighbours.

Jesus treated people of different races equally.

St Peter had a vision from God, telling him not to discriminate because God had no favourite race.

St Pauls taught that all races are equal in Christ since God created all races in his image.

The Christian Church has members of every race. Over 50% of the world is Christian and 70% of Christians not not white.

All the Christian churches condemn any form of racism or racial discrimination.

8 of 14

Islam and racial harmony

Muslims should promote racial harmony because:

The Qur'an teaches that God created the whole of humanity from one pair of humans so all races are related and none can be seen as superior.

Muhammad said that every Muslim is a brother to every Muslim, so their should be no racism between Muslims.

Islam teaches that all Muslims form a brotherhood, the Ummah. This means that all Muslims, whatever their race should see each other as brothers/sisters.

Islam is against any for of racism and Muslim leaders and local mosques work with various groups to promote racial harmony in the UK.

9 of 14

The UK as a multi-faith society

Many societies were mono-faith (only 1 religion) until the 20th century, Britain has had several faiths for years, by the end of the 20th century Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, Buddhists and other religions settled in the UK.

People can learn about other religions which helps to show people what they have in common,

People from different religions may practise their religion more seriously and can make other think about how they practice theirs.

People may come to understand different beliefs and become more understanding and respectful of others.

Religious freedom and understanding will exist in a multi-faith society and this may help to stop religious conflicts.

Multi-faith societies can even make people think about religious as they come across religious ideas they've never heard before.

10 of 14

multi-faith society issues - conversion

For a multi-faith society to work people need the same rights regardless of the the religion they do/don't belong to. A Multi-fatih society cant accept any religion as being the rue one, and the people living in the society must be free to choose.reject any/all fo the religions practised in the society, this can cause many problems:

Conversion:

Many religions see it as there duty to convert everyone because: that believe their religion is the only true religion, the only way for the followers of other religions to get to heaven it to be converted and their holy books teach then they should convert non-believers.

This can cause major problems because: treating people differently because of their religion and trying to convert them to other religions is discriminating against those who have a different faith to you, its impossible to say all other religions are wrong unless you study them all (which no one has) and it can lead to arguments/violence when people are told there religion is wrong.

11 of 14

multi-faith issues - children & marriage

Children: A multi-faith society required everyone (including children) to have religious freedom by being able to choose which religion to follow/reject. Children also need to learn about different religions in society, this can cause problems because:

Most religions encourage parents to ensure their children are brought up in their religion and become members of it.

Most religions teach that only those who follow their religion will have a good afterlife and parents worry what will happen to their children after death if the don't stay with religion.

Social and peer pressure compel parents to exert pressure on children to remain in their faith.

Children educated in state schools are tempted away from religious lifestyles into ones like other non-religious teenagers.

Interfaith marriages: In a multi-faith society, yound people of different faiths will want to marry. This raises problems because:

Often both couple must be members of the same religion to have a religious ceremony

There is a question of which religion the children should be brought up in.

There is a problem of what will happen to the couple after death.

The parents & relatives of the couple often feel betrayed.

Unless issues are dealt with, the religion itself works again CC and promotes conflict/hatred.

12 of 14

religions work together to promote CC in UK

The different religions in the UK have began to work to promote CC in the following ways:

Different religions are beginning to work with other religions to try and discover what is the same in their religions and use this to work out ways to live together without feeling the need to convert each other. For example, when Pope Benedict XV1 addressed a meeting of envoys from the Muslim world he expressed his respect for Muslims and said that the future world depends on Christians and Muslims talking & working together.

Some religious groups are developing ways of helping interfaith marriages by: Many protestant churches, liberal and Reform Jewish synagogues have special wedding services for mixed faith couple, The Church of England now has 'Guidelines for the celebration of interfaith marriages in church' and a website has been set up to offer help and give advice to couples from different religions.

The problem of bringing up children is being dealt with in different ways: Some Protestant Christian Churches, Liberal or Reform Jewish synagogues encourage mixed faith parents to bring up children in both faiths and leaders from the Church of England, Hindu, Sikh, Catholic, Muslim, Jewish and Buddhists faiths have agreed to follow the national Framework on Religious Education so that children in faith schools will now be taught the main religious practised in the UK.

The main way in which religions are trying to promote CC is through working together in special groups: National groups, such as the Inter Faith Network for the UK founded in 1987, they promote good relationships between people of different faiths in this country, Most towns and cities have groups that bring together different faiths in an area (eg. Glasgow Forum of Faiths) and their are individual places of worship which work together.